Fred Chartrand/Associated PressThe sight of an opponent celebrating a goal has become all too familiar to the Ottawa Senators this season.

NOTEBOOK

OTTAWA -- The Ottawa Senators, 13th in the Eastern Conference and 12 points out of a playoff spot, won't tear the team apart to set themselves up for a high draft pick.

"I read and hear the comments being made, 'blow up the team' or 'start over' or 'lose all the games so you can get the first pick.' I don't think that does any of us any good at this point," Senators GM Bryan Murray told Ottawa reporters Monday. "Maybe four years down the road it may make a difference, but this year and the next, I don't think (the media) would be very happy writing and talking on a daily basis that we've gone into the tank or whatever.

"We are not going to do that. We are going to try and play every game as a meaningful game. We may have to give a few young players from our farm team a chance to play some games for us, which could well be the case in a couple of individual cases anyway. But I want to see us play. I want to see if some of the players are what we think they are."

Coach Craig Hartsburg said of the Senators' long odds: "We don't worry about the math. It's one game."

Devils coach Brent Sutter said Tuesday he was pleased with the way his players returned from the All-Star break.

"We had a good push before the break and now we have to carry that on now," Sutter said. "I've been very happy with the guys. I think they're refreshed again and ready to go. There is a lot of intensity and emotion, so that's good."

Now comes the push.

"It seems to be the nature of it. The All-Star break seems to be the break," Sutter said. "After Christmas to the All-Star break is the second portion of the season and now it's the stretch run from here to the end of the year when every team has almost played the same amount of games. It's 75-80 days with 30 games, so you're almost playing every second day.

"It's the playoff hunt now. Teams are fighting for it now. Teams are trying to stay where they want to be, move forward and move up in the standings, and teams are trying to scratch and claw to get into that final playoff spot. It's an interesting time of the year from here to the end."

Former Devils forward Mark Johnson Tuesday was named head coach of the 2010 U.S. Olympic women's ice hockey team by USA Hockey. Johnson, a long-time veteran of the U.S. program as both a player and coach, is in his seventh season as head women's ice hockey coach at the University of Wisconsin.

Brendan Shanahan said the process of coming back in mid-season was no walk in the park.

"I expected it to be a lot of hard work, as any training camp is," Shanahan said. "When you squeeze it into six days, it's even harder."